Follow Me K9 Training

Happy Tuesday Helena!

What are you doing to make your pups smile today?

I love to take dogs hiking - it’s a great way to get them out of your house while you’re at work. I send you pictures and videos of our time together and we just enjoy exploring around Helena. If this is something, your dogs would love, send me a message and we can set up a time to meet to get the ball rolling!

All of my rescue dogs… oh I love them all so much!

If you adopted one of these dogs, I’d love an update on them! ❤️

✨

I have fostered many dogs. What I learned is that most people bring dogs home 100% wrong. It takes dogs about three months to settle into a new house and to realize that they are home so most people return dogs to shelters after a week because the dog isn’t working out. Most people bring the dogs home and say here you go here’s your new home and just throw the world at them.

Dogs that come from shelter environments or from a totally different environment may need decompression time. And it’s actually very good for any new dog to have decompression time. When I did board and trains, I would very rarely work dogs the first couple of days they were here because they needed time to adjust to a new environment and a new routine.

What does decompression look like?

What I would usually do is put the dog in a dark quiet crate away from Main traffic areas and give them three days of no touching no talking and no eye contact. I would take care of their basic needs. I would leave a long leash on them so that I could just pick it up and take them outside. And then I would just let them rest in their crate. Sometimes I would put essential oils in my diffuser and classical or calming music on, but that’s not necessary. I would put a crate cover over the crate or a blanket over the crate and just let the dog sit and take the sounds and the smells of the environment.

I want them to see that I am their provider and then I will take care of them. I want them to trust me. Usually, by the time those three days were up, we would be absolute best friends. But not in all cases, Raven, the dog pictured, took a little longer. She was so relieved just to get away from the noisy shelter. It took her two whole days to p**p in front of me though. That takes a lot of trust and they are very vulnerable when they’re p**ping.

Many people think that petting the dog and loving the dog is all they need, but that will make a dog worse if they are fearful. This decompression time also gives the dog structure which they desperately need. once they’ve gone through the decompression time of about three days, you can gradually start opening their world up. Just don’t do it too quickly. Baby steps. Keep their world small as they are adjusting to a new environment. Don’t just let them off leash and let them go. Teach them how to live in your home and teach them the rules of your home on a leash so that they understand what you expect from them. Hand feeding goes a long ways.

Hopefully this helps some of you. If you are fostering a dog and you need help, please reach out because I’m happy to help you for free. Every dog deserves their forever home.